In an ideal world all net marketers would have top performing affiliates who poured in traffic and created sales. However, we dont live in that world. A merchant is lucky to have one affiliate who is constantly motivated and selling. The rest may never make a sale and, after a month of trying, will lose the ambition to keep pressing forward.

How can merchants cope? How can they keep the level of enthusiasm about their business relatively high? It all comes down to the two things that make for any successful business communication and creative marketing.

Effective communication can get you what you want when you want it. And if the success of your online business rests upon how affiliates perform than effective communication should be your center focus. You can easily reduce the number of non-productive affiliates by remaining in touch with your affiliates on a regular basis.

Send an email reminding them of their password and username. Many affiliates are disorganized and can not keep track or their log in information. As a result they forget about the merchant.

Information about new product lines or changes in policies and procedures is also recommended. The more information your affiliates have about your business the easier it will be for them to promote it. Remember its their business too; keep them informed.

In your efforts to motivate your affiliates you should be creative in the way you communicate with them. This may involve holding virtual meeting, tele-seminars, personally calling them, or setting up a forum where they can ask you questions and discuss issues and success stories with others who are part of your affiliate team. You might invite a motivational speaker or send motivational emails and audio recordings to them. The key is to keep them encouraged.

Praise also helps. Always pay attention to who your top sellers are and make sure you contact them. Top sellers may get bored, even if they are making a profit. This is why you should concentrate on keeping your marketing methods current and with the flow of the web.

Your sales copy should always be up to date. Banners, text links and other creatives should be working and modern. You need to provide your affiliates with as many options as possible. Not all marketing strategies work for every website; ask your affiliates for feed back on your marketing resources.

Affiliate marketing has always been a win-win scenario. If majority of your affiliates are doing well then so are you. Therefore, its in your best interest to do everything possible to help your affiliates.